Andrew Cuomo: Pro-Life People ‘Have No Place in the State of New York’

/13 Comments/in , /by

Photo Credit: LifeNews

Photo Credit: LifeNews

Governor Andrew Cuomo of New York has already proven himself to be one of the most pro-abortion politicians in the country. He’s repeatedly pushed a bill that would make the state that has some of the highest abortion rates in the nation further down the road of unlimited abortions.

Now, Cuomo has said that pro-life people have no business living in the state. If the governor has any interest in pursuing national office with a potential Democratic presidential campaign, he’s definitely lost the majority of the country that appreciates the right to life of unborn babies…

As reported today:

Governor Cuomo is issuing a warning to what he refers to as the more conservative arm of the Republican party – you’re not welcome in the state of New York.

Moderate Republicans, or those most willing to capitulate to Cuomo’s own extreme agenda, still have the welcome mat rolled out.

Read more from this story HERE.

Mom’s Tribute to Stranger Who Entertained Daughter with Autism on Plane Goes Viral (+video)

/3 Comments/in , /by

kate-600Eric Kunkel might not really be 3-year-old Kate’s real Daddy, but for 2½ glorious hours on an airplane he generously assumed the child’s name for him.

Her fellow passenger’s act of kindness greatly touched Shanell Mouland, Kate’s mom, who was dreading the Jan. 5 flight home to Canada (by way of Philadelphia) after a weeklong family trip to Orlando.

Kate, who has autism and trouble sitting for long periods, can protest loudly when feeling uncomfortable, yet it appears both Mouland and Kate hit the jackpot when Kunkel sat down next to the little girl.

For some reason, Kate felt an immediate connection to the New Jersey businessman, reaching out to him and calling him “Daddy.” Kunkel happily played along, putting aside his work and entertaining little Kate for the duration of the flight.

His gracious attention to Mouland’s younger daughter prompted a three-hanky tribute to him on her blog, Go Team Kate, that has since gone viral.

Read more from this story HERE.

Birmingham, Alabama Abortion-Free for Now as Planned Parenthood Closes

/0 Comments/in , /by

Photo Credit: LifeNews

Photo Credit: LifeNews

Birmingham, Alabama is abortion free for now, as the sole abortion clinic there, run by Planned Parenthood, has temporarily closed. If it stays closed this is the second closure of an abortion clinic in 2014.

Local pro-life activist Fr. Terry Gensemer of CEC For Life tells LifeNews that sidewalk counselors report that the facility does not appear to have performed abortions since before Christmas. One counselor confirms that she has only seen a handful of patients show up in the past four weeks, none of which stayed long enough to have an abortion.

“But that’s just the start. On December 30th, after the facility was closed for several days, pro-lifers on the sidewalk witnessed the facility’s director being escorted from the building, followed by a repairman changing all of the locks. Three days later, a sign from Planned Parenthood Southeast (PPS) appeared stating that the facility would be closed until January 6th, 2014. After the 6th, sidewalk counselors say the facility did reopen, but only briefly,” Gensemer explained.

As of Tuesday, PPS posted yet another sign, now reading: “We apologize for the inconvenience, but this facility is temporarily closed.” The PPS website also removed the facility’s hours of operation schedule, as well as adding a note that reads: “Services at our Birmingham health center are temporarily slowed.”Gensemer hopes the closure will be permanent.

He told LifeNews, “This Planned Parenthood should have been closed long before today. It already has a lawsuit pending from a woman left infertile after the abortionist ignored her ectopic pregnancy and performed an abortion on her empty womb. Before that, the facility was caught in a round of scandal for allegedly covering up cases of statutory rape. For the sake of everyone this facility continues to harm, we are praying it remains closed.”

Read more from this story HERE.

UConn Rebukes Coach, says Jesus Doesn’t Belong in Football

/5 Comments/in , /by

Photo Credit: beisbolct

Photo Credit: beisbolct

The president of the University of Connecticut publicly rebuked an assistant football coach for telling The Hartford Courant that “Jesus Christ should be in the center of our huddle.”

“Our employees cannot appear to endorse or advocate for a particular religion or spiritual philosophy as part of their work at the university, or in their interactions with our students” President Susan Herbst wrote in a letter to the newspaper. “This applies to work-related activity anywhere on or off campus, including on the football field.”

Ernest Jones, the team’s new director of player engagement, set off the religious firestorm last weekend after he explained how the coaching staff would encourage players to embrace their spiritual faith.

Jones, along with new head coach Mike Diaco, had previously worked at the University of Notre.

“Just because you come to the University of Connecticut doesn’t mean you won’t have the opportunity to pursue your faith,” Jones told the newspaper. “No, you’re going to be able to come here and love the God that you love. So we provide opportunities for them to grown spiritually in our community.”

Read more from this story HERE.

House Committee Passes Bill to Completely Ban Taxpayer Funding of Abortions

/6 Comments/in , /by

Photo Credit: Life News

Photo Credit: Life News

The House Judiciary Committee today approved legislation that will put in place a complete ban on taxpayer funding of abortions that ensures abortions are not directly funded in any federal governmental program or department.

The legislation combines several policies that must be enacted every year in Congressional battles and puts them into law where they will not be in jeopardy of being overturned every time Congress changes hands from pro-life lawmakers to those who support abortions.

The bill has been around a few years but has only been approved in the House thanks to a pro-abortion Senate. On May 4, 2011, the House passed HR 3, the No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Act, on a 251-175 vote with Republicans voting 235-0 for the bill and Democrats voting 175-16 against it.

The House Judiciary Committee Subcommittee on the Constitution and Civil Justice will hold a hearing on H.R. 7, the “No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Act” this week.

Congressman Chris Smith, a New Jersey Republican who is the lead sponsor of the bill, informed the House that a study by the Guttmacher Institute, the pro-abortion former research apparatus of Planned Parenthood, released a study noting that one-quarter of women who otherwise would have had abortions chose to give birth when taxpayer dollars were not available to pay for abortions of their children.

Read more from this story HERE.

_______________________________________________________________________

Photo Credit: LifeNews

Photo Credit: LifeNews

Supreme Court to Decide if Pro-Life People Have Free Speech at Abortion Clinics

The Supreme Court today is hearing a case regarding a buffer zone outside abortion clinics in the state of Massachusetts. At issue is whether the state has the right to squelch pro-life free speech and prevent pro-life advocates from protesting or offering women information about abortion alternatives.

Today’s oral arguments concerns the constitutionality of a Massachusetts law that creates a 35-foot “buffer zone” restricting pro-life advocates from speaking with people entering abortion facilities.

Alliance Defending Freedom filed the lawsuit McCullen v. Coakley in 2008 with then lead counsel and allied attorney Michael De Primo and has also provided funding for the case since then. De Primo is currently litigating the case together with two other allied attorneys, Philip Moran and Mark Rienzi. Rienzi, professor of constitutional law at Catholic University of America’s Columbus School of Law, is now lead counsel alongside attorneys with the Washington, D.C. firm Wilmer, Cutler, Pickering, Hale & Dorr, LLP.

“Women considering abortion have the right to talk to whomever they please on public sidewalks,” said Rienzi, who will argue before the court Wednesday. “That includes peaceful pro-lifers like Eleanor McCullen, who just wants to offer information and help to those who would like it.”

“The government cannot be allowed to create censorship zones where the First Amendment doesn’t apply,” added De Primo. “This buffer zone censors speakers from engaging in constitutionally protected speech. We hope the Supreme Court will agree and strike down the law that created the zone.”

Read more from this story HERE.

Husband of Pregnant, Brain Dead Texas Woman Sues Hospital

/3 Comments/in , /by

Photo Credit: AP/THE FORT WORTH STAR-TELEGRAM

Photo Credit: AP/THE FORT WORTH STAR-TELEGRAM

The husband of a brain-dead, pregnant Texas woman has sued the hospital keeping her on life support against his wishes.

Erick Munoz filed a lawsuit in state district court in Fort Worth, where his wife, Marlise Munoz, has been on life support since he found her unconscious in their North Texas home on Nov. 26. She was 14 weeks pregnant at the time. Her family says the exact cause of her condition isn’t known, though a blood clot is a possibility.

Erick and Marlise Munoz, both paramedics, had seen life and death up close and he previously told The Associated Press that his wife was clear with him: If she fell into a condition like this, pull life support and let her die.

John Peter Smith Hospital in Fort Worth, however, has refused to take Marlise Munoz off machines, citing a state law the hospital says requires it to continue treating a pregnant patient.

Munoz’s lawsuit says that law doesn’t apply because Marlise Munoz is legally and medically dead. The condition of her fetus is unclear.

Read more from this story HERE.

First Grader’s Speech Stopped, Told to Sit Down: Cannot Talk About Bible

/6 Comments/in , /by

Photo Credit: ADVOCACY FOR FAITH & FREEDOM

Photo Credit: ADVOCACY FOR FAITH & FREEDOM

The parents of a six-year-old girl said their daughter was humiliated when a teacher interrupted the child’s one-minute speech and told her to sit down because she’s “not allowed to talk about the Bible in school,” attorneys for the California family allege.

The incident occurred Dec. 19 inside a first grade classroom at Helen Hunt-Jackson Elementary School in Temecula, Calif. The previous day the teacher instructed boys and girls to find something at home that represented a family Christmas tradition. They were supposed to bring the item to school and share the item in a classroom presentation.

Brynn Williams decided to bring the Star of Bethlehem that adorned the top of her family’s Christmas tree. She also worked on a one minute presentation to explain that her family’s tradition is to remember the birth of Jesus at Christmas time.

“Our Christmas tradition is to put a star on top of our tree,” the little girl said. “The star is named the Star of Bethlehem. The three kings followed the star to find baby Jesus, the Savior of the world.”

Before the child could utter another word, the teacher intervened, according to Robert Tyler, the general counsel for Advocates for Faith & Freedom – the law firm representing the Williams family.

Read more from this story HERE.

Planned Parenthood Did 1 Adoption Referral Per 149 Abortions

/7 Comments/in , /by

Photo Credit: AP

Photo Credit: AP

In its latest annual report, released in December, Planned Parenthood says it did 327,166 abortion procedures in the course of one year and 2,197 adoption referrals. That works out to approximately 149 abortions for each adoption referral.

The data comes from an accounting of “patient care” Planned Parenthood says its “affiliate health centers” did in the year that ran from Oct. 1, 2011 to Sept. 30, 2012.

Planned Parenthood says in it new annual report that it received a total of $540.6 million in government grants and reimbursements for the fiscal year that ended on June 30, 2013. That accounted for almost 45 percent of the organization’s total revenue of $1,210.4.

The 327,166 abortions Planned Parenthood did in the year from Oct. 1, 2011 to Sept, 30, 2012 was down 6,798 abortions from the 333,964 abortions the organization did in the year from Oct. 1, 2010 to Sept. 30 2011.

Still, the 327,166 abortions that Planned Parenthood did from October 2011-September 2012 works out to approximately one abortion every 96 seconds.

Read more from this story HERE.

Over 56 Million Abortions in America Since Roe vs. Wade in 1973

/2 Comments/in , /by

Photo Credit: Life News

Photo Credit: Life News

Given the trends seen in recent national reports, National Right to Life now believes that there have been over 56 million abortions since 1973.

One critical piece of evidence in that calculation arrived in November of 2013, when the U.S. Centers for Disease Control (CDC) reported its latest national figures. It was important to find out whether the drop in abortions for 2009 seen by the CDC–4.6%–would continue in 2010. If it dropped again, we’d have some confidence that the 2009 figure wasn’t just some odd statistical aberration, that there really was some real and significant decline. It did.

As reported in NRL News Today, abortions for 2010 declined another 3.1%, according to the CDC. (See “CDC Report Shows Decline in Abortions for 2010; abortion rates and ratios both down”)

We typically like to compare and confirm those trends with data from the Guttmacher Institute, the former special research affiliate of Planned Parenthood which publishes its own private study.

Guttmacher, which surveys abortion clinics, hospitals, and private practice physicians directly, has higher and what are widely thought to be more reliable abortion numbers. Unlike the CDC, however, they do not survey every year, and have not, as of this date, published anything more recent than 2008 data when Guttmacher reported there were 1,212,400 abortions.

Read more from this story HERE.

Texas Judge Orders Home Schooled Children Removed from Christian Parents Home

/6 Comments/in , /by

Photo Credit: WND

Photo Credit: WND

A controversy has erupted in Texas after a judge ordered children removed from the home of their Christian homeschooling parents – over the homeschooling itself – even though the Texas Home School Coalition notes the state doesn’t allow that.

A 2005 memo from the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services notes that,”Whether parents choose to homeschool their children or send their child to another private or public school is not relevant to the CPS investigation. When CPS staff investigates a family for abuse/neglect, the investigation must focus on the occurrence, or risk, of abuse/neglect and not on the child’s educational setting,” according to the Texas Home School Coalition.

However, of the allegations brought against Trevor and Christina Tutt, who had four biological children and three foster children removed by Child Protective Services several weeks ago, all have been about the educational setting.

According to a report this week at Christian News, social workers were brought in when a child temporarily in the Tutts’ care, a four-year-old with autism, and an eight-year-old, wandered a short distance from the home in September.

A police officer found the children before Tutt, who was searching nearby, and the subsequent report attracted the attention of CPS.

Read more from this story HERE.